1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to providing an improved mail networking scheme, and more particularly to a PBX (private branch exchange) or central office system facilitated mail networking system and method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Telephone messaging systems are common in both homes and the workplace. Currently, a user can call someone on another PBX (private branch exchange) via a public or a private network. With currently available systems, if the remote user (i.e., the user being called) does not answer or if the remote telephone is busy, the telephone call is forwarded to a remote voice mail system. This assumes that a remote voice mail system is present and functional. After listening to an outgoing announcement, the caller can leave a message for the called individual. When the remote voice mail system has a different user interface than that of the local voice mail system, the caller must listen to the whole outgoing announcement before the caller can start recording a message. Furthermore, a user/caller cannot edit, delete or otherwise control a recorded message when a different user interface is provided by the remote voice mail system.
Voice messaging (or voice mail) networking is a feature that enables users to record messages on their voice mail messaging systems for later delivery to users on other voice mail messaging systems. This is possible because the two voice mail messaging systems are connected via the voice messaging networking. Most voice mail systems can network with other voice mail systems by using the Audio Messaging Interchange Specification (AMIS) protocol which has been accepted by the voice mail industry. In the digital environment, x.400 can be used for digitized messaging. In addition, major vendors in the voice mail industry have developed their own proprietary voice mail networking protocols. To use the AMIS protocol, a user must have the message delivery telephone number for the remote voice mail system. Unfortunately the message delivery telephone number is usually unknown. Thus, to use voice messaging networking, users must know the message delivery telephone number of the voice mail system associated with the person they wish to call.
Voice mail networking is a cost saving feature that is underutilized because of lack of user understanding, lack of tariff information and/or lack of information about the corporate voice mail network. This underutilization results in higher communication costs.
As stated above, one drawback of current systems is that the user must know the message delivery number. In a private voice mail network, the message delivery number is usually entered into the system by a network administrator. In a public AMIS network or a x.400 network, the user has to address each message with the message delivery number of the remote messaging system. The developers of the AMIS protocol envisioned each person's business card containing their voice mail delivery number in addition to a regular telephone number. This vision never became a reality.
It is desirable to have a system which increases the utilization of the voice mail networking feature without burdening users with the need to know and enter the message delivery number or any other number (e.g., a networking access prefix number) of the remote voice mail system. This would result in reduced communication costs.